allowed to drift while the lifesaving work was going on. "We want
to make time back."

"This certainly is a surprise," remarked Larry Dexter, as he tried
to wring some of the water out of his clothes.

"More to me than it is to you, I guess," suggested Dick. "I suppose
you birdmen are used to accidents like this?"

"More or less," answered the cousin of Innis Beeby. "But I never
expected to come to grief, and be rescued by Innis."

"Nor did I expect to see you," said the cadet.

"We were just speaking of you, or, rather I was, as we saw your
craft in the air. I was wondering if you had perfected your
patent."

"It doesn't look so--does it?" asked the airship inventor, with a
rueful smile in the direction of the sunken aircraft. "I guess I'm
at the end of my rope," he added, sadly. "But I'm glad none of us
was killed."

"So am I!" exclaimed Dick. "But how in the world did you come to
take up aviation, Larry?" he asked, of the young newspaper man.
"Have you given up reporting?"

"No indeed," replied Larry Dexter. "But this air game is getting
to be so important, especially the army and navy end of it, that my
paper decided we ought to have an expert of our own to keep up with